Can you post a pic from further away so we can see the whole house?

I agree with k9arlene.

Thank you so much for your help!!!

Congrats on your new digs! I would not bother beefing up the shutters for they can not be made to look authentic and any shutter will be too narrow to fully cover the glass so if your are a purist then remove them all together and if you are not a shutter purist, and many people are not and that is ok, I would save the money and keep the ones you have.

I do think painting the front door and garage will go far.. Due to maintance I am not sure I would paint the cedar. Maybe use a white stain to give the look with out the chips, but I kinda like the cedar with the brick...

Mulch around the tree and mailbox and add some perennial ground covers to those spots for grass will be a hard grow under the tree. Aerate the grass and reseed this fall. And over the winter look at pictures of foundation plantings and keep an inspiration file. I would save the landscaping til next spring. Like kitchens and baths it takes time to plan the front landscaping.

Very cute home, I think painting the stairs white would look nice, however if you live in an area with harsher weather, be sure to pick your paint wisely. We live where there's four seasons and we made that mistake with our deck. Now that you've posted a better view of the front, it's easier to see that two of the three windows don't have enough space to make them look proportionate. If you don't care for them though maybe you can just take them down. If you keep them up, you could paint them and the door the same color, but I'd leave the garage doors white. I'd get new beefier lights to flank the garage and install a new door light too.

I'd remove the box hedges and put some daylillies where that little bed is next to garage. Then build a curvey flower bed in front of the stairs, maybe put a pretty Japanese maple in the center with some hostas or day lillies around it. Maples stay small and make for a really pretty decorative tree.

This is kind of what I am talking about, it's budget friendly but has color and interest with plantings that are super easy to care for.

Carve the bush in front of the front door so that the door and steps show. (I might not remove them altogether just yet.) The house itself looks spiffy enough--it's the landscaping. Visit the landscaping forum here. They're tough but helpful. :)

http://forums2.gardenweb.com/forums/design

It's a cute house and just needs some tweaking! I would paint or stain the steps and railings a dark charcoal to match the shutters. I think white would be too stark with that much wood at the entrance; dark will fade into the landscape. (maybe someone with the skills would photoshop options for you.

I'm curious what the entry steps looked like when the house was constructed and why they built these the way they did, as they do look too casual for the style of your home. But it's totally possible to work with them and improve the look.

I'd remove those popsicle bushes in a hot minute - even tho they do effectively hide some of the entry porch- and really concentrate on planting and perhaps expanding the flower beds to minimize and complement the entry steps. Do visit the landscape forum for design ideas and the garden forum for your part of the country for help choosing specific plants that will do well where you are.

Please keep us posted on what you decide to do.

Very pretty home! All you need is money, grading, retaining walls and some sort of gradual steps to the door. I would also look into a porch overhang above the door. Doing that will take your home from attractive to WOW.

For now I would paint the railing step area a dark charcoal color. I would leave the shrubs (trim down ) and expand the beds out with lower plantings.

For starters, I would remove the shrubs on either side of the garage, the ones in front of the stairs and the corner of the house.

It's a very cute house. Congratulations!

I would also get rid of the shrubs. My eye is immediately drawn to them and they do nothing for anything. There are lots of planting options that will really enhance your home's curb appeal. I wouldn't wait till fall or spring to take them out. Once they're gone, you can better imagine what to put in their place in the spring.

I'm not a purist when it comes to shutter size. There are lots of homes where I live that have shutters similar to yours. I think it's a decision you can make later, if at all.

I really like justerrilynn's suggestion of a porch overhang. Lots of options. All it takes is a budget. :)

To the OP...do you have a budget (everyone does), and if so, how much? It would give us a better framework with which to work when we offer advice.

The house looks fine to me. The only thing I'd change is to add larger lights that are in proportion to the size of the house. I'm not sure I'd want to get into the upkeep of painted steps and railings and I'd wait on that. Maybe you'd want to change the entryway in the future. But for now, the shrubs around the porch and along the foundation have to go. They're too tall and bare at the bottom so they are screening the wrong part of the structures they're in front of. I'd remove them with a saw and mulch under and around the deck. Do not use red mulch! I'd also remove the tree. It looks weedy and is placed where it blocks the view of the house. For some summer color, you could enlarge the half circle around the mailbox, add compost to the soil, and plant annuals.

Yup, definitely ditch the boxwood shrubs all around the porch. Do lower gardens similar to those posted.

White porch might be nice, but maybe not worth the effort. Maybe post more pics if you lose the boxwoods.

Flowers around the mailbox would be pretty, but I'm lazy about upkeep so i'd just plant grass, personally. Let the front of the house shine instead.

Hope you get back with us on a budget. If there is a very low budget I would do something like A,B or C except maybe darker than my charcoal mock-up on the porch/railing color for a faux iron look. Put a bit of beefier trim above the door and add an overhead light, trim down hedge to the brown line and add some plants to fill in the leggy bits of existing shrubs. I know I'm in the minority about not doing a complete shrub removal...especially if the budget is low. I think they are a good thing and help hide the railing/steps that are a bit rustic casual for the home. The shrubs do need to be lowered though and have the bottom filled in with plants. Trim porch shrubs and shub to the left of garage door the same height. I would remove the shrub on the right of garage door.

While playing around I tried a few colors on your front door. Without a porch overhang there the door with color just emphasized the look of the door floating in mid air with no lines lining up with the rest of the home. Adding another color to the house without a porch overhang messed with my eye, there is already a black/charcoal a white a blue and the brick color.

Are you getting new garage doors?

If you have a big budget scrap this idea and do something along the lines of my post above or see the last few mock-ups.

Mock-up (A)

BEFORE BELOW

Or, Maybe a brown that would mesh with the brick? This is just a quicky!

Mock-up (B)

Mock-up (C)

Mock-up (D)

Mock-up (E) below

Mock -up (F) below

Mock-up (G) below with a darker terraced winding step walk up, lighter house paint and an arch porch overhang. The arch is my fav.

You basic problem is mediocre landscaping that has been ignored and become overgrown.

Start by planning and let some ideas brew. Drive around and look at homes in your area and notice what appeals to you. Notice whether the planting is formal and structured or more relaxed and natural. Are the plants greenery and textures or more blooms? Notice the color and textural differences in leaves and plant structure. Once you know what appeals to you, you can see what you can work into your landscaping. After all, it will be the first thing that welcomes you home everyday -- it should make you smile and feel happy to be home.

First thing to do will be to clear the slate. Clear out all of the bushes across the front of the house and beside the garage. The take the left most trunk of the crepe myrtle out -- cut it down to the ground and keep trimming back any sproutts that try to come up so you can have a better view of the front door.

Second thing is to define your beds. It looks like there are no borders and the grass, weeds and beds all run together -- especially over on the right. Take your garden hose or a can of spray paint and mark where you want you beds to be and step back and take a look. I would come out from the railing and toward the drive so you have room to plant some varied color and texture like in lukkiirish's post. Clear everything in the bedding areas -- add soil and compost, edge it to define it. Now you have a place to plant. I would come back then and ask for help if you need it. My preferences go to some evergreens and a variety of foilage colors and textures and blooms -- spring, summer and fall, including some berries in late summer and fall. I like perennials and pollinator friendly plants, so I wouldchose somethings that invite the birds, butterflies and hummers (yeah, they are a bird, but they get their own invitation -- along with the Monarchs, who get milkweed). I would probably plant a tree in the right corner, but pullled out from the house so it has room to grow. Finish with mulch.

Part of me wants to paint the garage, but I can't say for sure what. Another option would be to add hardware. Lowe's and Home Depot have magnetic trim to look like carriage house style hardware -- less cost and you can try on the style before committing to it or putting holes in your doors. Definitely some larger lanterns or fixtures that you can actually see beside the garage and front door. Then consider painting the front door a color -- not a must, but something to think about when you get the other things done.

I don't think you need to paint the railing and agree that could become a headache to maintain. You might decide to change it to a metal or other railing if you don't like the cedar, but the cedar blends in with the brick and gives you the ability to put your accents elsewhere. I'd try working with it. Also agree the shutters are fine -- the landscaping is the biggie here.

The stairs bother me the most, I feel that area should be stained black. They will not stand out as much. The rest is yard work. The house looks fine.

The stairs bother me the most as well.

Cute house. Our first house was a lot like yours, complete with similar wood stairs to the front door. Our budget was very limited. We made our house very cute just by changing the landscaping. When we first moved in we had shrubs planted by the builder that looked very similar to yours, placed similarly to yours, only much smaller since the house was new.

If your budget is small here's what I would do. First, I wouldn't paint the steps right now, I'd spend the time and effort on the landscape. I would not wait until next spring to do that, depending on your zone, of course. Where I live the best time to start planting shrubs and trees is fall and winter. At least get a landscaping plan in place now.

Second, I wouldn't plant any perennial flowers like daylilies. Instead I'd get the bones of your yard in place, first. Then add perennial flowers later if you like, after you get the mainstays of your landscaping in place.

I'd chart the sun in your front yard. What is the sun like in the morning, mid-morning, noon, mid-afternoon, early evening. Take photos of your yard. Then I'd take the photos and sun info to a local plant nursery, preferably on a day when they're not busy. Talk to them about what kinds of shrubs or ground covers are low-maintenance, drought resistant, pest resistant, easy for beginners in your area. We had a landscape architect come out and draw up a rough plan for us and talk to us about how to edge our beds. It was worth every penny. He thought of everything. All season interest, easy to grow, shrubs never needed pruning and the plant colors looked beautiful with our house. If you can afford it, that is a great way to go, but if you can't afford it, someone in your local plant nursery should be able to help. Our try the landscape design forum, as someone above suggested. Don't go to a big box home improvement store, go to a plant nursery. Make sure you get advice on proper spacing of your plant material; you want to plant it the correct spacing for long-term, not short-term, growth.

A curved bed would look nice, extending from the corner of your house to around in front of your steps. I'd rip out the shrubs you have, use a water hose or spray paint as someone above suggested to mark the bed. I'd cut a small, v-shaped trench around the edge to the bed to hold the mulch in, or you could edge your bed with brick or something else. Plant new, low-growing shrubs that are evergreen or have 4 season interest, pest resistant, disease resistant, easy to maintain. Or some type of ground cover, or a combination of both. Be sure to follow the guidelines on spacing your plants, even though that will look super bare to you at the start. As someone above suggested, a low-growing Japanese maple would look lovely as a specimen plant maybe at the corner of your house, if that grows well in your area. Be sure and space it the correct space away from your house and don't get it too close (good advice for the shrubs, too). Kill the grass in that area, plant the shrubs/trees/etc., then mulch the bed. Personally I don't think I'd want anything very high in front of that low window that is covered up by one of your shrubs. I'd want light coming in that window. So probably very low shrubs or maybe some nice ground cover.

If it looks bare after you're done, you can always hang a lovely hay rack planter on your step railing and plant something beautiful and trailing there. Or plant annuals along the edge of your bed.

After all that, if you still want to paint the steps and front door then paint away.

You'll be surprised how adorable your house will look with better landscaping. Find out how to maintain the grass well, too, and that will help as well.

Best of luck to you. I hope you are as happy in your new house as we were in ours.

justerrilynn the dark looks sooo much better. I see this a lot, the cedar decking in the front and I think well it is not horrid but just not quite right. The color! It makes all the difference. I myself would sink any money I had in devising something maintenance free. That set of stairs will be a yearly job. The house really is very attractive. How dramatic and fabulous it will look with a splash of paint and a saw!! Great suggestions!!

I think the other thing that will really help the house is to get rid of those bushes, put some low growing bushes by the stairs, and some pretty flowers.

I'm going to be odd man out as usual and suggest not to put a lot of money into the landscape at this time. Yes I would spiff it up for now but really you need to think into the future. To me your home really needs a winding terraced stepped walkway up to the door ( see my first post near the top). I really don't see the point of an overly involved plan for landscape that would need to be ripped out.

Of course if you do not have any plans on ever changing the rustic casual wood steps to the front door then disregard this post reply.

It wouldn't be cheap to do a winding terraced walk. What is the market like in your neighborhood? Would it be worth it to add to your curb appeal with something so fabulously beautiful? Or, do you plan on living here for a very long time so cost vs value doesn't matter?

You're getting lots of different opinions based on what bugs each of us the most. What bugs YOU the most? Which things do you look at and wish they were different? Or what just looks a little off or not quite right? That will give us a better starting point to help you!

I guess we each give advice based on our own experiences and what has worked or not worked for us in the past. When we bought our first home it was a smallish home that took most of our readily available cash to buy, so we were on a super tight budget as far as improvements. Our plant landscaping took very little money compared to nice hardscaping. Nicer hardscaping would have overimproved our house for the neighborhood, anyway. When we moved to our next house we did change the sidewalk out to a much nicer, wider one with steps and we used more expensive, elaborate plant materials as well. Because our first house was smaller the financial outlay for the plants wasn't much. We did the work ourselves, it was easy to do and not that much effort.

I, too, think the OP's house would look adorable with a lovely, winding, terraced, stepped walkway. If the OP wants to go that way, it would look great. I'm glad my husband and I didn't make that choice in our first house, but perhaps the OP has a bigger budget or a neighborhood that could support a more expensive entrance.

Remove the bushes around the stairs, I like lukki's landscape idea, and remove the wall-mount lights by garage and door. Replace the garage lights with overhead flushmounts that wash light down, for a glow instead of points of light. Over the door, put a nice pendant light, or maybe a goose-neck mounted on the wall about the door.

I love the soft brown that justterrilynn showed!

Here's the brown with the winding terraced walk except I do not know how to draw what's in my head grrr. Anyway, it would also look nice with an overhang up there.

Mock-up (D)

As I mentioned above it's hard to do a door color on the house that doesn't go with one of the many existing colors. So, in this case it's brownish, brick, white or blue. I keep going back to white but don't know. If there was more symmetry one could just pick a color. Since that's not the case it just looks a mess. I tried a lighter, darker and brighter take on the existing blue. I tried a warm brown (not bad). Don't know...back to white?

I love the color scheme CP has suggested. Then again, don't know your budget and getting your exterior of your house painted might not be in the immediate budget. But something to keep in mind.

The steps and rail could be stained - not painted, as that will readily peel - a darker color. Although I can't tell if your steps and rail are stained or painted already... if painted, sand off, or you would paint over these.

The terraced stepped walkway to the front door that justerrlynn designed is beautiful, but some of your guests bearing gifts or pot luck casseroles may well find access difficult without a hand rail for balance. (That's my ankle and knees speaking.... loudly.) Safety is always a positive. Elderly guests would also often like hand rails. Change, if you wish, but don't entirely remove a hand rail!

The shrubs are leggy, and are best removed. At this point, they won't prune down. Not sure where you are located, but if you are going into hot weather, best to wait until autumn to replace.. although you can pull up / cut out the existing now. (and put in some long flowering annuals such as petunias just for this season).

A lot of your planting will depend on whether you are full or part sun. Look to see what you like that grows in neighbor yards. Research final height, growth speed, prune-ability, and root requirements. I brought my phone to my garden center as I was selecting this spring.

I think you are right Artemis, it needs some things to hold on to. I didn't get the scale right but added some columns and rails and changed the door back to white. In reality the brick columns need to be further up the white overhang columns. That would visually allow the porch overhang peak to go higher. So, this mockup isn't exactly right but should give an idea of possibilities.

This is a bigger to big budget idea. We still do not know the budget though.

Mock-up (E)

In addition to the landscaping which will take lots of time
to plan and implement, I really like the charcoal painted steps and looks very
good with the house. To my mind the house itself is fine, it is the color
of the upper level that makes the house look not quite right. Consider changing the color
to one that looks better with the color of the brick; for example, white or
light taupe. Sherwin Williams Accessible Beige might be nice, and either Benjamin
Moore’s Natural Linen or Whitall are nice colors to go with the pink tones
of the brick. Because the bricks have a pink tone, you need to avoid
greens and blues. The charcoal you have
going also looks very nice with the colors mentioned, as well as being complimentary to the bricks. Do not believe the garage doors need to be
painted another color at all. These are just my opinions.

Ohhh I like that idea Walnut! I'm not sure I got your colors right. Also, as I mentioned above I do not have the scale right. The brick columns should be further up the white porch column which would allow a taller pitch on porch roof and a less leggy look to the white columns.

Mock-up (F)

Your mockup looks very nice, justerrilyn. Would you mind doing one with the charcoal shutters and charcoal stairs? Wish I knew how to do thee mockups.

Hi Walnut, I'll be back on later and give that a go. Changing the upper paint will also make it a bit easier to do a door color. Still not easy though with the pink in the brick. Part of me wants the brick painted.

Did we lose/overwhelm OP, you think? So many great ideas, I hope she comes back.

Hi Oly, usually when this happens people become overwhelmed by all the responses (?) but come back eventually?

Here you go Walnut, I changed the overhang a bit. Its a little messy as I do a lot of this stuff by hand.

This is my FAV!

Question: Would carriage door accessories look right on this style of home? If so I can add. Although I worry it could look busy.

Mock-up (G)

I like the top mock up so much. It is great! I do not believe the garage doors would look right with any kind of accessories, simply because there is so much above the garage doors. Does that make sense?

I really like that one as well Walnut. I fixed the proportions of the porch and columns and I really like the arch on the overhang to mock the other arch's. And, I really like your suggestion of a darker stair step (helps tie in the roof shade) and the light paint color. I also changed the white garage doors to match the color on the top which really ties it all in.

Team work!!!

I wonder if the OP is ever coming back?

I sure hope the OP comes back, justerrilynn.

Wow, Justerrilynn, you have supplied some wonderful options and visuals. What software do you use? I really would like to teach myself how to use Photoshop or something.

Hi Clair, I first do drawings such as the terraced steps, porch overhang and landscape by hand drawing on top of loaded photo using Microsoft paint software. I also use MP to apply color. One can also use MP to cut & past. I then switch to photobucket for any special effects. This is a very antiquated way to do this though. There are programs where it could all be done in 1/4 the time I'm sure.